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EJToday: Top Headlines

EJToday is SEJ's selection of new and outstanding stories on environmental topics in print and on the air, updated every weekday. SEJ also offers a free e-mailed digest of the day's EJToday postings, called SEJ-beat. SEJ members are subscribed automatically, but may opt out here. Non-members may subscribe here. EJToday is also available via RSS feed. Please see Editorial Guidelines for EJToday content.

"WASHINGTON -- A wide-ranging surveillance operation by the Food and Drug Administration against a group of its own scientists used an enemies list of sorts as it secretly captured thousands of e-mails that the disgruntled scientists sent privately to members of Congress, lawyers, labor officials, journalists and even President Obama, previously undisclosed records show."

"The beleaguered federal agency that oversees oil and gas pipelines meets today to consider lobbying push-back against congressional orders that it stop charging the public up to $995 to read one of its industry-developed safety standards."

"Shell has asked the Environmental Protection Agency to loosen air pollution requirements for its Discoverer drill rig, which is planning to begin exploratory drilling operations off the North Slope of Alaska early next month."

"Four years ago, something started to change. First it was slow, and then this past month that change became dramatic. Coal now generates just 34 percent of our electricity, down from about 50 percent just four years ago."

"There’s a term biologists and economists use these days -- ecosystem services -- which refers to the many ways nature supports the human endeavor. Forests filter the water we drink, for example, and birds and bees pollinate crops, both of which have substantial economic as well as biological value."

"Apple Inc rejoined the EPEAT environmental ratings system on Friday, acknowledging that its decision to stop participating in a program that rates the green credentials of electronic products was a mistake."

"WASHINGTON, DC -- The same 'man-made' problems underlying last year's nuclear disaster in Japan exist today in the United States, warn five U.S. groups responding to the Fukushima Nuclear Accident Independent Investigation Commission's report to Japan's Diet, or parliament."

"Despite promises from the nuclear industry to regulators and consumers that they learned from mistakes of the past, the nation's first two nuclear reactor projects built from scratch in 30 years are headed toward hundreds of millions of dollars in cost overruns and months, if not years, of delays."

"WASHINGTON -- The worst Midwest drought in a quarter century is doing more damage to U.S. crops than previously expected with the government on Wednesday slashing its estimate for what was supposed to be a record harvest."